The School for Advanced Research on the Human Experience (SAR), until 2007 known as the School of American Research and originally founded in 1907 as the School for American Archaeology (SAA), is an advanced research center located in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA. Since 1967, the scope of the School's activities has embraced a global perspective through programs to encourage advanced scholarship in anthropology and related social science disciplines and the humanities, and to facilitate the work of Native American scholars and artists. SAR offers residential fellowships for artists and scholars, and it publishes academic and popular non-fiction books through SAR Press.
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In the early years of the 20th century, archaeology was a young discipline with roots in historical studies of Old World antiquities. In 1906 Alice Cunningham Fletcher, an anthropologist and ethnographer of Plains Indian groups, was on the American Committee of the Archaeological Institute of America. The AIA, founded in Boston in 1879, had schools in Athens, Rome, and Palestine that sponsored research on classical civilization and promoted professional standards in archaeology. Fletcher wanted to establish an "Americanist" center to train students in the profession of archaeology, to engage in anthropological research in the Americas, and to preserve and study the unique cultural heritage of the American Southwest. Her aims coincided with those of Edgar Lee Hewett, an educator and amateur archaeologist whom she met in Mexico in 1906.[1][2]
Nicknamed "El Toro," Hewett was a controversial figure. He served as president of New Mexico Normal School in Las Vegas (now New Mexico Highlands University) from 1898 to 1903, where he taught some of the first anthropology courses to be offered at any U.S. college. His work lobbying for the protection of archaeological sites led to the creation of Mesa Verde National Park and the passage of the U.S. Antiquities Act of 1906.
In December 1907, the American Committee of the AIA accepted Fletcher's plan to establish the School of American Archaeology and appointed Hewett its director and Fletcher as the first chairperson of the School's managing committee.
Santa Fe, then the capital of New Mexico Territory, was chosen as the School of American Archaeology's headquarters in part because the territorial government offered the historic Palace of the Governors as a permanent home. In 1909, the legislature established the Museum of New Mexico as an agency of the School, creating a relationship that would continue for the next 50 years. Hewett became director of both the Museum and the School.[3] In 1917, the School of American Archaeology changed its name to the School of American Research to reflect a broader mission:
"to promote and carry on research in Archaeology and related branches of the Science of Man; to foster Art in all its branches through exhibitions and by other means which may from time to time be desirable". (Articles of Incorporation 1917)
Midway through its first year of operations, the School was immersed in excavating Pueblo ruins on the eastern edge of the Pajarito Plateau, west of Santa Fe, and conducting the first of its field programs. Many legendary archaeologists, among them Neil Judd, Alfred V. Kidder, and Sylvanus Morley, were trained at SAR field labs at Tyuonyi Ruin on El Rito de los Frijoles (now part of Bandelier National Monument), Chaco Canyon, Puye Cliff Dwellings, and other sites. The School also sponsored excavations in Mexico, Guatemala, and South America, and led the effort to preserve 22 Spanish missions in New Mexico. While directing the School, Hewett founded departments of anthropology at the University of Southern California and the University of New Mexico.
Through the Museum of New Mexico, the School took an early interest in promoting and preserving the artistic traditions of Southwestern Indians. Indian workers assisted at the School's excavations on the Pajarito Plateau, and their interactions with Hewett, Kenneth M. Chapman, and other archaeologists led to a recognition of individual talents and traditional aesthetics. Hewett and Chapman, an artist hired by Hewett to head the art department at New Mexico Normal School, and later one of the first employees of the School of American Archaeology, provided extensive support for Indian artists. They offered studio facilities, as well as collecting and exhibiting their work. Early Native artists promoted by SAR included Maria Martinez, Crescencio Martinez, Awa Tsireh, and Fred Kabotie, among many others.[4] In 1922, the School sponsored the first Southwest Indian Fair, precursor of today's world-renowned Santa Fe Indian Market.
Hewett led the School and Museum until his death in 1946 at age 82. A 20-year period of relative inactivity followed. The School continued to pursue archaeological research projects on a modest scale. It was headed, successively, by Sylvanus Morley, Boaz Long, Wayne L. Mauzy, Edward Weyer, Jr., and Eugene McCluney. This transition period ended in 1959, when the State Legislature formally separated the Museum of New Mexico from the School. The School of American Research was gutted, left with a staff of two and an uncertain future.
In 1967, Douglas W. Schwartz, a young professor of anthropology from the University of Kentucky, became the new director of the School of American Research. Schwartz broadened the School's focus to embrace advanced scholarship in anthropology and the humanities worldwide; and to promote the study, preservation, and creation of Southwest Indian art. Schwartz also continued the School's archaeological research with field excavations in the Grand Canyon in the late 1960s and, in the 1970s, the excavations of Arroyo Hondo Pueblo.
Over the years, SAR's offices had relocated from the Palace of the Governors to the Hewett House on Lincoln Street. In 1973, the School moved into an old adobe estate on Santa Fe's east side. El Delirio had been the home of Martha Root White and Amelia Elizabeth White, wealthy New York businesswomen. Built in the 1920s, the estate was a popular gathering place for Santa Fe artists, writers, and intellectuals—among them Hewett, Morley, and others associated with the School. The White sisters were avid promoters of Indian art, and together they opened the first Native American art gallery in New York City. Elizabeth also was a founding member of the Indian Arts Fund (IAF) in Santa Fe and sat on SAR's Board of Managers for 25 years. When Elizabeth died in 1972 at age 96, she left El Delirio and other Santa Fe properties to the School. In that same year, the IAF disbanded and deeded its collections of Southwest Indian art to the School.
The new campus, with its numerous buildings, permitted the realization of Schwartz's vision for the School. The Advanced Seminar Program was inaugurated in 1968, and has since sponsored more than 120 seminars, the results of which are published by the School's SAR Press. The Resident Scholar Program, launched in 1972, has provided over 180 scholars with residential fellowships. The construction of the Indian Arts Research Center in 1978 gave the collections inherited from the IAF a suitable home. In 1988, the J. I. Staley Prize was established to recognize books by living authors that exemplify outstanding research in anthropology. Over the succeeding two decades, several residential fellowships for Native artists were also established. In 2005, SAR entered the new century with a new president, Dr. James F. Brooks, formerly Director of SAR Press, as the School's new director.
The School for Advanced Research offers residential fellowships for scholars and Native artists, and internships are provided for Native students pursuing academic careers and/or professional careers in museums. The School also sponsors scholarly seminars through its Advanced Seminar and Short Seminar programs. The results of many of these programs are published through SAR Press. The School recognizes outstanding books in anthropology with the annual J. I. Staley Prize. Public outreach includes membership, lecture, and tour and field trip programs. SAR recently created an educational website at [www.southwestcrossroads.org] for New Mexico grade-school students. The president of SAR is historian James F. Brooks, who received eight national history awards for his 2002 work, Captives & Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, and Community in the Southwest Borderlands (University of North Carolina Press). The long range vision for the School includes the addition of six resident fellowships for scholars and artists, new studio and research space, and major expansion of programs and collections at the Indian Arts Research Center.